Toure - City must deliver

03 October 2012 08:19

Manchester City midfielder Yaya Toure has stressed he and his team-mates are under no illusions about the significance of tonight's Champions League home clash with Borussia Dortmund and says they are ready to 'deliver'.

City are looking to get their European season kickstarted against the German champions after being beaten 3-2 by Real Madrid at the Bernabeu in their Group D opener.

"It is a massive game for us," Toure said. "We will need to work hard because we know Dortmund are a fantastic team. They are competitive, they defend together and they attack together. It will be a tough game. We know that and we are prepared for that. We need to get a good result. We have a good squad and we need to deliver."

With Dortmund having begun with a 1-0 win over Ajax, the pressure is on the Blues to secure all three points this evening if they are to avoid a repeat of their maiden Champions League campaign last term, which ended in failure to qualify from another difficult group.

City boss Roberto Mancini believes preventable errors cost his team in Madrid, and he feels they must improve quickly to reach the knockout rounds.

The Italian is optimistic, though, that if the Blues manage to up their game and make it beyond the group stage, they can go all the way.

"Like we have improved (over the years) in the Premier League, we need time to improve in the Champions League, but we don't have a lot of time - only five more games," Mancini said.

"We need to not concede easy goals to drop points like we did against Real Madrid. If we want to go through, we need to improve very quickly."